Split by construction unions hasn’t been felt locally

By RANDOLPH HEASTER

Columnist

A recent split by two national construction unions from an AFL-CIO group has not affected local alliances so far, a labor official said last week.

The Laborers International Union and the International Union of Operating Engineers, representing 1.1 million members, said they would break away from the Building and Construction Trades Department AFL-CIO effective Wednesday. Membership in the AFL-CIO’s umbrella group for the construction trades will fall to 2 million.

Garry Kemp, executive director of the Greater Kansas City Building and Construction Trades Council AFL-CIO, said last week that local business agents for the Laborers and Operating Engineers had not indicated they were breaking away from the local group.

“At least for the present time, I see no changes for the building and construction trades at the local level,” he said. “But what the future brings is another matter at this point.”

The two construction unions have indicated that they will form a new group called the National Construction Alliance. Joining the new federation will be the four other national unions: the Teamsters, carpenters, iron workers and bricklayers. The carpenters withdrew from the national AFL-CIO several years ago.

The move mirrors a shake-up that occurred last year at the national AFL-CIO when a number of unions broke away to form the Change to Win coalition. They were the Service Employees International Union, the United Food and Commercial Workers and Unite Here. Also joining Change to Win were the laborers, which did not leave the AFL-CIO main body, and the United Farm Workers.

The construction unions leaving the AFL-CIO’s building and trades unit gave similar reasons for leaving as the Change to Win unions. More emphasis on organizing workers is needed, said Terence O’Sullivan, laborers’ president.

“While the construction economy has grown, living and working standards for construction workers have fallen,” O’Sullivan said in an Associated Press article at the time of the announcement. The percentage of construction workers belonging to a union has fallen from 40 percent in 1970 to 13 percent, he said.

Kemp said the turmoil among the construction unions at the national level was expected given what happened with the AFL-CIO last year.

“Long term, what we’re witnessing is change in an industry that has been slow to do so,” he said. “The situation developing for the international unions was not a question of ‘if’ but ‘when.’ ”

But Kemp is hopeful that the conflict will remain in Washington and not spread to other parts of the country. Even after last year’s split by the Change to Win unions, many of those union’s locals have remained active in the regional and local AFL-CIO bodies.

Kemp said the Carpenters District Council and Iron Workers Local 10 had not belonged to local building and construction trades unit since 1996.

“But we continue to work together on matters of interest to working people,” he said. “We all have a sense of duty to our members.”

Including the carpenters and iron workers, the Kansas City construction unions represent about 20,000 construction workers and nearly 4,000 apprentices.

Two new officers

The Mechanical Contractors Association of Greater Kansas City recently announced the election of two new officers.

Steve Hancock became vice president. Hancock is vice president of estimating/business development for the Foley Co. of Kansas City. Also, Mike Kotubey was elected treasurer. Kotubey is president of Midwest Mechanical Contractors Inc. of Kansas City.

Bill Heck, vice president of Environmental Mechanical of Olathe, was re-elected president of the association. Re-elected to the association’s board were Dan Oxler, vice president of U.S. Engineering in Kansas City, and Bob Rimel, chairman of All State Mechanical in Grandview.

To reach Randolph Heaster, call (816) 234-4746 or send e-mail to rheaster@kcstar.com .